Intro prices lie. We computed the 3-year steady-state cost — 36 months at each host's published renewal rate — for all 6 hosts:
Method: 36 × published renewal rate. Intro discounts excluded on purpose — they're one-time by definition, and ranking by them is how the trap works. Want to play with the numbers yourself? Try our hosting cost calculator — 12, 24 or 36 months, all six hosts.
InterServer is the cheapest 3-year total — and the only bar that can never grow.
Hosting is one of the few products where the sticker price and the real price are different numbers — by design. A $2.95/mo intro that renews at $11.99 costs you $35 in year one and $144 in year two. Over the life of a real site (3+ years), the intro is a rounding error and the renewal is the bill.
That's also why a price-lock beats every coupon: InterServer's $7/mo is $252 over three years by contract. Every other “cheap” host on this list can raise its renewal whenever it wants — and historically, they do.
None of these are reasons to overspend — they're reasons to compare the 3-year number, not the banner.
By 3-year total: InterServer at $252, price-locked. Hostinger and DreamHost tie around $288 at renewal. Anything advertising under $3/mo is an intro rate — check what it renews at.
Not directly. Google cares about speed and uptime, not your invoice. A cheap host with solid uptime outranks an expensive slow one. That said, the cheapest plans sometimes share overloaded servers — another reason to weigh renewal-tier quality, not just price.
Only with a price-lock or a host you'd happily stay with. Prepaying three years at an intro rate just prepays the trap — you'll still renew high in year four. With InterServer's lock, prepaying is safe because the rate can't rise.
For the first month, yes — our exclusive code DEVHOST01 drops eligible InterServer plans to $0.01. After that it's the locked $7/mo.
$252 over three years at a locked $7/mo — plus $0.01 for month one with DEVHOST01. No other host on this list can promise the same price in year three.
Exclusive: first month $0.01 with code DEVHOST01 at checkout
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